Using site-specific research to inform landscape-scale restoration and management of Great Lakes coastal wetlands

Nearly 1/3 of the 8,000 km of U.S. shoreline of the Great Lakes lies in lowland areas that once supported extensive coastal wetland complexes.  The vast majority of those wetlands, and the ecosystem services that they provide, have been lost or severely degraded by drainage for agriculture, isolation by diking, establishment of invasive species, and other landscape-scale stressors.  The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and other regional funding efforts are supporting widespread restoration of these critical habitats and increased coastal resiliency.  However, the impact of individual site-specific projects can be maximized by modeling and planning on a landscape scale.  USGS is working with USFWS, state, and other resource managers in western Lake Erie to conduct site-specific coastal wetland research to evaluate ecosystem response to hydrologic reconnection of diked wetlands, model and map regional ecosystem response under alternative future scenarios, and use the results to support landscape-scale restoration and management strategies.  These strategies will support strategically coordinated actions among coastal resource managers in Ohio and Michigan and the growing regional network of connected conservation lands across western Lake Erie.